From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.8 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_DATE autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,df52cf364e9edc0a X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 1994-12-07 09:11:04 PST Path: bga.com!news.sprintlink.net!howland.reston.ans.net!news.moneng.mei.com!uwm.edu!news.alpha.net!news.mathworks.com!zombie.ncsc.mil!paladin.american.edu!auvm!EIGHT-BALL.HV.BOEING.COM!crispen Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Message-ID: <9412071642.AA02438@eight-ball.hv.boeing.com.hv.boeing.com> Date: Wed, 7 Dec 1994 10:42:35 CST Sender: Ada programming language From: Bob Crispen Subject: Re: Is DoD simulation ignoring using Ada????? Date: 1994-12-07T10:42:35-06:00 List-Id: Doc Elliott sez: > From the POV of one who deals with this on a everyday basis, there are some >explanations in order. First of all, based on previous posts here in CLA, >there >are no tools available to support Ada bindings to the DIS protocol (yet?). Doc, just about everyone who did a demo at I/ITSEC in the past 3 years has developed a nice set of DIS Ada bindings and probably socket bindings as well. Developing Ada bindings isn't rocket science; it's well within the capabilities of somebody with a year or two of Ada experience. The fact that some folks are charging megabucks for Ada bindings is shameful and dumb, considering the wealth of Ada talent within the Services and their Primes. But put all that aside. Surely somebody has developed for one of the Services a simulator in Ada that has a DIS interface. Just reuse their bindings. You already paid for them once. Now as to why the heck those things were originally developed in C, I may join Greg on that one. Shame on those folks. In fact, the more or less mandated use of the C coordinate transform code last year gave us (and anybody who didn't define their radians values as plain old FLOAT) some constraint error problems. Finally, the Ada Simulation Validation Program final report noted (in 1987!) that Ada was a perfectly wonderful simulation language. Service folks, you paid for that program. In the meantime we and lots of others have written all kinds of simulations in Ada. >The SGI platform that most of our Virtual Prototypes run on is rich with >such tools as Paradigm Sims (audio) and Software Systems Multigen which works >well with the Paradigm "Vision Works" tools. All of this stuff is C based, >commercially available, pretty well rung out, and has a good user base. Calling C from Ada is an old, well-known trick. You or someone else there already knows how to do it. In some situations, you can even make a shell script to do it automatically. Where's the problem? Ohhhh -- it's a "non-standard", non-portable trick. Jeez, the guys who are up to their asses in single-source, proprietary hardware and software sure start getting religion when they talk about Ada, don't they? Yes, I know you're talking about the perception versus the reality, but isn't it incumbent on anyone in engineering to squash nonsense when (s)he hears it? Good Lord, I've become Greg. Stop me before I post again! +-------------------------------+--------------------------------------+ | Bob Crispen | Who will babysit the babysitters? | | crispen@foxy.hv.boeing.com +--------------------------------------+ | (205) 461-3296 |Opinions expressed here are mine alone| +-------------------------------+--------------------------------------+